Faingold at Large Presents: Rocktober – Part 2: The Shondes in Chicago Tomorrow!
Unfortunately my Rocktober rambling is limited by other obligations (deadlines, pfft, whatever) but if I could, I would surely be heading to The Hideout (1354 W. Wabansia in Chicago) tomorrow night to see The Shondes. The band’s name is Yiddish for The Shames and their newest CD The Garden is the most rock and roll…
Faingold at Large presents: Rocktober – Part One: Neutral Milk Hotel last night in Urbana
This week, as a busy autumn concert season kicks into high gear, Faingold At Large will be taking several detours from the well-trodden path of Springfield music and arts to attend and otherwise report on shows in the surrounding region, including forays into the scenes in St. Louis, Chicago and Bloomington. First, a quick jog…
Moocher
Last week I didn’t want to write another rant about corporate moochers any more than you probably wanted to read one, but as long as these kinds of deals keep getting proposed, we will have to keep ranting. I mentioned in that column my view that Archer Daniels Midland, or ADM as the firm prefers…
Art Opening Tonight: ‘Shadow Aspect’ at DEMO Project
An opening reception for “Shadow Aspect,” a new installation by Brooklyn-based multi-media artist Kathleen Scott, is happening at DEMO Project this evening from 6PM-9PM. True to its title, the exhibit features shadows cast from cut paper, promising to “use a variety of rotating light sources so the shadows will slowly travel about the room, interacting…
Between The Cracks: Ernest T & The Rock Throwers Tonight!
Once again, Faingold at Large proudly presents “Between the Cracks” – the recurring feature designed to shine a light onto Springfield-area bands, and all in their own words, to boot. Join us, won’t you? There’s gold between them thar cracks! Today’s BTC spotlight lands on local rock and rollers Ernest T and the Rock Throwers…
Grave matters
This is a glimpse of a car trip flanked by billowy clouds, suspended raindrops on my car window and light brown soybean flats surrounded by palisades of corn. A hint of dark cast upon our prairie that day. Fitting for my destination to Abraham Lincoln and Vachel Lindsay’s final resting place in Oak Ridge Cemetery.…
Quinn vows to veto ADM, cites pension reform ‘issue of a lifetime’
Gov. Pat Quinn refused to say for several days whether he’d support a $1.2 million a year tax break for Archer Daniels Midland to move 100 jobs out of Decatur and open up a world headquarters and new tech center in Chicago. But last week he made it clear that without pension reform, the ADM…
Letters to the Editor 10/10/13
Washington Street Mission, 408 N. Fourth Street, sits just north of the proposed site for a homeless shelter and directly north of the mission is residential high-rise Sangamon Towers, 424 N. Fourth Street. Sangamon Towers’ parking lot is east of its building with access onto Fifth Street where St. John’s Breadline sits across the street…
One chicken, two people, three meals
A whole fresh chicken can make three yummy meals for two people. PHOTO BY TAMMY LJUNGBLAD/MCT “That One Chicken, Two People, Three Meals was the most useful, most outstanding class you taught,” Springfield orthodontist Dick McDaniels told me recently. It wasn’t the first time he’s said that. Certainly it was my most popular class, one…
Judge rejects retrial in ‘shaken baby’ case
Pamela Jacobazzi A former day care worker accused in 1995 of killing an infant by shaking him was denied a retrial last week, dealing a rare setback to the Springfield-based Illinois Innocence Project. DuPage County Circuit Judge Robert Kleeman on Sept. 20 declined to grant a retrial to Pamela Jacobazzi, 58, who has spent the…
News Quirks 10/10/13
Curses, foiled again• Police investigating break-ins at dozens of businesses in Montgomery County, Md., identified Andre Antonio Henry, 30, as their suspect in what authorities termed a one-person “crime wave” after finding his name on court documents that he apparently dropped at the scene of one of the burglaries. “Obviously, that’s a clue,” prosecutor Stephen…
Does Inherit the Wind say something today?
Other cast members look on as Henry Drummond (Jim Dahlquist, right) questions Matthew Brady (Rich McCoy, left) PHOTO BY DONNA LOUNSBERRY Is it timeless or just old? Inherit the Wind may be a staple of community theater, but can a fictionalized account written 58 years ago about something that happened 88 years ago resonate with…
Pennies and nickels
For a lot of people in Springfield, Decatur is just a place to stop when you get hungry on the way back from a U of I game. But people live there too – at least some still do; the city has lost nearly 20 percent of its population since 1980. And it’s going to…
Ezra Furman and the Harpoons
PHOTO BY ROSIE WAGNER A performing songwriter since 2006, Ezra Furman hangs out in the indie-rock, folk-rock, original music land and calls Chicago home. With the Harpoons, the group delivers ferociously friendly sounding on-the-beat and in-your-face songs with sweet and sour lyrics balanced between personal experiences and existential dialogues with the universe as a conversational…
PBS Kids sensation
PHOTO BY PATRICK KOLTS Kids are in for a treat as Steve Roslonek of SteveSongs performs two concerts at Sangamon Auditorium UIS. A rising star on the national kids music scene, Roslonek has performed at the White House, the Kennedy Center and Boston’s Fenway Park. But he is best known as Mr. Steve, co-host of…
Quick wit
PHOTO COURTESY PORTUGUESE RODEO CLOWN COMPANY Witness the art of improv as the Portuguese Rodeo Clown Company performs at the Hoogland Center for the Arts, Oct. 11 and 12. The small troupe will unleash two hours of unscripted theater from audience suggestions. And those with the best suggestions walk away with not only a smile,…
DEADLINE? WHAT DEADLINE?
Accused of hiding assets, embattled entrepreneur Jeffrey Parsons has missed a court-ordered deadline to respond to allegations that he lied under oath while concealing more than $1 million from a federal bankruptcy court. Parsons had until last Friday to respond to accusations from bankruptcy trustees Jeffrey Richardson and Charles Covey, who have both accused him…
The future is now
“Blow ashes into flame. Start a brotherhood of your own. Live in the New City that is revealed to you, as we are living in our City and in the streets of our Tomorrow.” – Vachel Lindsay Renowned Springfield poet Vachel Lindsay’s 1920 novel, The Golden Book of Springfield, quoted above, expressed a romantic, utopian vision…
Trans-Pacific Partnership: Aka corporate coup
What if our national leaders told us that communities across America had to eliminate such local programs as Buy Local, Buy American, Buy Green, etc. to allow foreign corporations to have the right to make the sale on any products purchased with our tax dollars? This nullification of our people’s right to direct expenditures is…
Purrforming critters
PHOTO COURTESY AMAZING ACRO-CATS The all-around astonishing performance cats are back in town along with their animal buddies Garfield the groundhog, two chickens and four rats, all wearing their witch hats and long green hair. It’s the Amazing Acro-Cats, bringing you several shows from Oct. 10-13 at The Legacy Theatre. The band of felines trained…
Girl-a-Thon again
Girl-a-Thon returns for 2013 at Boondocks, Sunday, Oct. 13, 2 p.m. Wow, what a wonderful time of year! I just spent an afternoon picking apples and now get to spend months eating them. I’m okay with that. Lot’s of goodies this weekend with the entertainment stuff. Let’s get to it. What would October be without…
bowdlerpoem #1
a pure minded pedant of yore(starts like a limerick don’t youthink? never fear) well this guypurged ancient literature of anyoffense he eliminated all suchtainted material but he was toomuch a scholar to get rid of ittotally so he put it in appendicesthat meant all us latin and greekstudents didn’t have to search forthe naughty bits…
Groundbreaking visuals save Gravity
Sandra Bullock as Dr. Ryan Stone and George Clooney as Matt Kowalski in Gravity. PHOTO COURTESY WARNER BROS. PICTURES’ Movie studios, and film critics, are prone to hyperbole, so it’s often advisable to take anything that either says with a grain of salt. That being said, you need to trust me when I say that…
Don Jon an entertaining look at skewed expectations
If Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s debut as a director proves anything, it’s that he’s a filmmaker to watch. With Don Jon, he not only tackles the thorny issues of sexual addiction and the media’s impact on our perception of the world, but he ably uses editing, camera movement and pace to create an aesthetic that reflects the…
Social notworking
My 40-something younger brother has been “friending” my hot female friends on Facebook, women I have befriended in real life whom he’s never even met! I said nothing at first. Then, one of these women posted a photo of herself, and I commented on it in a flirtatious way. Up pops my brother, commenting on…
Maestro Willis: ‘A great season’
In its opening concert, the Illinois Symphony Orchestra performs Igor Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, which caused a sensation when it debuted in Paris 100 years ago. PHOTO COURTESY ILLINOIS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA This week marks the start of Alastair Willis’ second season as music director of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra. The energetic maestro is nearly bursting…
Will Congress learn its budget lessons?
Will Congress ever get its act together? That question is likely on the minds of many Americans, but the latest impasse should actually serve as a reminder that we need to redouble our efforts to make sure Congress focuses on the right priorities and moves the country forward. As a former educator, I do not…
Community clinic begins expansion
Breaking ground on the new expansion for Central Counties Health Centers is (from left to right) CCHC board chairman Bobby Hall, Springfield mayor Michael Houston, Ward 3 Ald. Doris Turner, and CCHC president and CEO Craig Glover. PHOTO BY PATRICK YEAGLE A clinic offering health care to underserved people in and around Springfield started an…
Autumnal outing
PHOTO COURTESY LINCOLN MEMORIAL GARDEN Lincoln Memorial Garden will welcome in fall on Columbus Day weekend, Oct. 12-13 with their popular Indian Summer Festival. Family activities on the grounds will include crafts, face painting, storytelling, puppet shows, pumpkin decorating and fairy house building. In addition to more than 40 craft vendors, Art in the Garden…
PRAYER FOR BREAKFAST
Behold the power of prayer: When a lawsuit threat last year from a national anti-religion group forced the City of Springfield to stop organizing the annual Mayor’s Prayer Breakfast, several groups in Springfield stepped in to organize the event privately. Okay, so that can’t really be attributed to prayer, but it’s certainly a testament to…
Death in the jail
Amon Paul Carlock performed as Klutzo The Clown for kids and had never been in trouble with the law before his arrest. The death of A. Paul Carlock of Springfield haunts Sangamon County nearly six years after the police officer turned clown died during a stint in the county jail. Charged with possession of child…
